Is Yeshua God: From a Typology Perspective

by Stephen Otto

Many professing Christians believe that Yeshua (Jesus) is God, yet they struggle to explain how He is one with His Father. Perhaps the best way to understand it is through typology.

In His pre-existence, Yeshua was a created being and is referred to as the Son of God. In speaking of Him, Paul wrote, “...who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation" (Col. 1:15). After His creation, Yeshua created the angels (John 1:1-4; Col. 1:15-16; Heb. 1:2-3; 1 Cor. 8:6) who are also Sons of God (Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7).

Later, after God created man, Abraham, whose name means “father of a multitude.”  had a son named Isaac. God commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son, but just before he did, God stopped him and provided the ram for the sacrifice instead. In this typology, Abraham was a type of God, the Father, while Isaac is a type of God, the Son, Yeshua, who would be sacrificed for the sins of mankind.

The Scriptures teach that kind begets kind. Thus, just as Abraham and Isaac were two separate people of the human kind, divided by two generations, God the Father and God the Son are two separate individuals of the God kind, separated by two generations.

Thus, typology indicates that God the Father and God the Son are not the same person. It also demonstrates that God is in the process of creating a family after the God kind. Paul states, "For this reason, I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named..." (Eph. 3:14-15).